“The charge that McCain is sacrificing his own cherished and hard-won reputation, and that he may never recover it if his campaign keeps this up, is most certainly correct,” New York Observer columnist Steve Kornacki wrote about John McCain going negative. “But the assumption that this will also destroy his chances of winning the presidency — or even diminish them — has less basis in reality.”
Kornacki argued that McCain can’t win just by being himself, because of the sizable anti-GOP mood in the country. “What can win him the election, as sad as it is to say, is the kind of campaign he is now resorting to,” Kornacki wrote. “McCain’s aides have privately told the press that they see the fall race as a referendum on Obama. They are right. This campaign is not about hordes of undecided voters weighing the pros and cons of McCain and Obama; it is about hordes of undecided voters who are inclined — both because of his party label and his personality — to vote for Obama, but who still have trouble imagining him as America’s commander in chief.”
What great news that July’s 13 U.S. troop deaths in Iraq were the fewest in any month since the war began in March 2003, and that President Bush is talking about more troop withdrawals. But how disappointing that a political deadlock is preventing Iraqi leaders from settling a power-sharing dispute and proceeding with provincial elections. There is more disagreement between the Kurds and the central Iraqi government over a new oil law. The surge was meant to promote political progress as well as quell violence.
Wal-Mart is mobilizing thousands of store managers and department supervisors around the country to warn that if Democrats win power in November, they’ll likely change federal law to make it easier for workers to unionize companies, the Wall Street Journal reported. The horror. The articled added: “The Wal-Mart human-resources managers who run the meetings don’t specifically tell attendees how to vote in November’s election, but make it clear that voting for Democratic presidential hopeful Sen. Barack Obama would be tantamount to inviting unions in, according to Wal-Mart employees who attended gatherings in Maryland, Missouri and other states.”
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., said that in opposing drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge and offshore, she was “trying to save the planet.” But columnist Charles Krauthammer contends that “the net environmental effect of Pelosi’s no-drilling willfulness is negative.” He wrote: “Outsourcing U.S. oil production does nothing to lessen worldwide environmental despoliation. It simply exports it to more corrupt, less efficient, more unstable parts of the world — thereby increasing net planetary damage.”
T. Boone Pickens is giving wind power a big boost with his energy plan. Another sign that America is poised for a renewable energy revolution: MIT researchers reported last week that they’ve discovered a way to save solar energy for use when the sun doesn’t shine — a major breakthrough. Previously, storing solar energy has been prohibitively expensive and inefficient, according to MIT, which said the team’s discovery could unleash a “solar revolution” and “transform solar power from a marginal, boutique alternative into a mainstream energy source.”
Beyond his popularity in the “Big First,” Rep. Jerry Moran, R-Hays, would have another plus should he follow through on his reported interest in running in 2010 for the Senate seat to be vacated by Sen. Sam Brownback: Moran’s $2.1 million in campaign cash, more than $1 million of it raised this election cycle. By contrast, Moran’s November opponent, Democrat James Bordonaro of Emporia, reported raising just $70 for his campaign account, which has a negative balance.
“The charge that McCain is sacrificing his own cherished and hard-won reputation, and that he may never recover it if his campaign keeps this up, is most certainly correct,” New York Observer columnist Steve Kornacki wrote about John McCain going negative. “But the assumption that this will also destroy his chances of winning the presidency — or even diminish them — has less basis in reality.”
